Six Business Areas You Wish You Were Involved With

We are familiar with the idea of sunrise and sunset industries, but what about sunburst sectors ones that catch the moment or happen to be in the right place at the right time?
Below we try to identify ones that should be doing very well at present.

Let’s start with the obvious – anti bacterial hand wash and face mask sellers.
With swine flu due a comeback when the weather gets colder, we’ll see even more of this stuff in receptions and lavatories. We’ve recently even seen it on people’s desks with passers by encouraged to have a squirt.

Recruitment businesses.
This sounds counter intuitive, they should be doing badly at present, and relative to two years ago many are, but what is interesting is the ones who are quietly meeting the returning market with a more compelling value proposition. They’ve realised that simple job filling is no longer good enough, they need to offer more; real depth in sector specialisms, consultants who have insight into the market, client and candidate management processes that are professional and service orientated that create memorable user experiences. The better ones also are working on the transformational possibilities of technology.

Internet start ups.As the computer becomes more like a phone (or vice versa), digital TV switch over gets closer, touch screen technology enfranchises the computer illiterate and bandwidth becomes larger generating faster speeds, we will see a new wave of internet business ideas and applications. Communication convergence is going to be massive, with new users using new services and the savvy providers extending and reinventing their offerings.

Celebrity driven businesses/brands.
This is more than famous people endorsing things, but them taking real control over what they are doing and creating real new businesses. Victoria Beckham’s fashion label is growing at a phenomenal rate, created from scratch less than two years ago. Have a look at www.sarahbeeny.com; first there was the TV programme, then the ‘mysinglefriend’ dating web site, and now there is ‘tepilo’, a house selling web site, combining her celebrity reputation with internet cleverness and her property development background.

Renewable energy.
This sector has already had some false starts, whether (pun intended) caused by fluctuating government policy or the cost of fossil fuels, the UK has had an inauspicious first decade. This will change. As the climate data gets worse and more compelling/scary depending on your point of view, consumer behaviour will reach a tipping point. We all will realise we live in the age of consequences and will need to construct real lifestyle changes.